Page 39 - Mark Chews Forty Two Australian Wooden Sailing Boats Sept 17 2020

MARIS was laid down in Jock Muir's Battery Point yard in Hobart in 1958, and was
the first of the Alan Payne-designed Tasman Seabird class yachts to begin
construction. It became the second to be launched after sister ship CHERANA, but
was the first to go sailing. She was commissioned by the globe-trotter and famous
marine artist Jack Earl (OAM) who had sailed his previous yacht the double-ended
ketch KATHLEEN GILLETT in the first Sydney to Hobart race, and then undertaken
a circumnavigation of the world.
Jack initially approached Payne with sketches of a double-ender similar to
KATHLEEN GILLETT for ocean racing and cruising. Payne showed him the plans he
was preparing for the sloop-rigged Tasman Seabird and was able to convince Earl
that this would be suitable. Earl had one condition; he wanted a two masted rig,
and after MARIS was launched it was fitted with a mizzen mast and rigged as a
yawl. Earl also instructed the builder to include a rack and pin arrangement to
secure the tiller at different angles, while balancing the boat with the set and trim
of the sails, a feature he had used with success on KATHLEEN GILLETT. MARIS was
built using Huon pine planking over hardwood ribs and backbone.
She was particularly special for Muir’s because she was the first boat on which
splines were used. The splining did away with the cotton caulking and putty
traditionally used for sealing the planks. When splining, you take two planks and
cut a normal 'V' shape, then take a cut spline and run it through a small trough of
glue and hammer it in with a club hammer and a lump of wood. The hull then
becomes one solid skin instead of a series of planks on their edges. MARIS has a
Huon pine hull, Tasmanian oak keelson, spotted gum frames, oregon spars. Many
of the fittings Payne drew for this design were custom made items.

Jack Earl (OAM) competed in two Sydney to Hobart races in MARIS, and sailed it
extensively around the Pacific to Canada and the USA, often with his family. In
1971 Jack decided it was time for a smaller boat and sold the yacht to Ian Kiernan.

CYAA Magazine Issue 43 September 2020 Page 39